A Summary of R&D needs for gas injection processes

As shown in the title slide, gas displacement has three broad areas of application to oil recovery, namely miscible, or "nearly miscible", processes, gravity drainage, and fractured reservoir systems. We have seen papers at th is Conference which come into each of these categories. The technology of gas displacement is becoming mature from some points of view, ahhough there are still many stimulating and difficult research challenges for the future. Gas displacement is now established as a successful and economic method for Improved Oil Recovery in light oil reservoirs, even with oil prices as low as say $18 per barrel. The controlling parameters are oil recovery efficiency, where 5 Mscf/bbl is not an unreasonable net target with gas recycling, and gas price, which needs to be in the range of $1-2 per Mscf. In terms of resource conservation, an advantage of gas displacement is that the injected gas is not all lost, but most of it can be produced later for another purpose.